


Human Shield

by breath_e



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Asphyxiation, Child Abuse, Depression, Dysphoria, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Suicide mention, Trans Male Character, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-04
Updated: 2015-06-04
Packaged: 2018-04-02 22:25:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4076017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breath_e/pseuds/breath_e
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Anonymous said: Davejake? From this prompt (the blog its from is otpprompts) ‘Imagine person A helping person B after top surgery, maybe even going shirtless for person B’ you can make either trans or nb. Thank you! :)"</p><p>“Breathe.” Dave whispered softly, rolling up the ace, Jake’s skin slowly regaining a glow of life with every open-mouthed breath that lodged in his throat as he stifled more sobs, “Fuck, breathe,” Jake nodded, as Dave’s fingers padded up and and down Jake’s back, skimming over the arch of his spine, his lower back, his ribs curling through. He stayed in this trance forever, passing delicate fingernails over his skin, breaking down his frantic breaths into nothing more than closed eyes and open souls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Human Shield

**Author's Note:**

> [ Human Shield- Hannah M ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=soFkWG0J4e4)

No matter how many facts humanity can arise and how many glitches are thrown away through words of steel, sharpened at the point, and stained with the blood of millions before it, people will always change. A hand in these times, pushing on the wounds, stifling every pool between cascades of blood can help, but in the end, infection of the mind settles, and everything will rot soon enough.A person to stand in front of the dagger, take the pain and stake their lives, knock the victim from its path, it always the best, taking a hand once more, and running to safety for change to follow. Stars glowing in the eyes with the luck, the luck that they can change, the luck they know they can, and the luck that there will always be someone next to them as their guardian angel, demon, defect, and rebel.  

 

Jake met Dave in elementary school, when the clocks in their mind had just started ticking, and when Jake wasn’t known as Jake. Dave pushed him off the swing, but not three hours later, when school’s lights were dimmed, Dave was shoved into the door of Jake’s house for an apologetic play-date, fresh bruises under his eyes like wilting, infected bloodstains.

 

Dave took one look to Jake’s offensive, soft eyes and sighed, holding out his hand, “I want to be your human shield.” He said plainly, behind his plastic, dissected emotions, as Jake opened the door a bit wider, quirking an eyebrow, and taking Dave’s cold, clammy hand in his scraped own.

 

* * *

 

 

Jake really met Dave in middle school when they were splaying out frosty frogs on lab boards, and Jake, with new clothing, and a chosen name only a select few called him. Dave looked at the scalpel as if he wanted the blade to tease with his skin and tug out every once of intestines out and lay them sideways, count the rings of his spine and pull it slo-wl–y through his neck. Jake set his jaw and took Dave’s elbow. Before he could spill out any stupid phrases, stupid lies, Jake pushed him into the lockers, furrowing his eyebrows,

 

“Jiminy crickets, what is wrong with you!?” He shouted, voice peaking over what he considered to be comfortable as Dave struggled, but he held him firmly, digging the digits of his fingers into his collar.

 

“Jake, get the fuck off of me,” Dave growled in response, shoving Jake backward. Jake put his hands in the air, a bitter expression painting himself, as he trapped Dave in his gaze, “I’m fine,”

 

“Of-fucking-course, beat the elephant in the room around the bush until the cows come home, why don’t you!” Jake hissed, his eyes narrowing against Dave’s mirrored face. He snatched Dave’s hand rather aggressively, rushing down the hallway, and stopping abruptly before the men’s restroom before groaning and pushing it open, “Look at yourself! You’re a mess!”

 

“I’m fine-”

 

“Oh bullshit! Tell me what’s wrong or I’ll lock you in here.” Jake spat, managing to cross his arms father over his chest.

 

“Nothing to talk about.”

 

“Dave!” He cringed, biting on his words like flesh, but everybody could see the blisters and chapped skin, so why cloak it? Jake sighed, rubbing his brow, face softening under his touch, “Dave… I am worried. So don’t futz it up, wanker. I want to assist you, because if I see you glance at blades one more time, I will break your bones one by one.” He paused, snapping his fingers together in remembrance, “I-” His face contorted as he fitted his hands into the hems of his baggy sweatshirt, “I want to be your human shield!”

 

* * *

 

 

Dave really met Jake in high school, when Jake’s sharp glances fell glazed over, his eyes looking but not seeing, the way his heart burned like a cold engine in which none of the parts fit, rusted over, dark, but stable, barely, and the way he coughed and hacked for air he could not hold. When Jake was seventeen, he got his driver’s license, and the moment he touched the lifeless wheel, the thing that kept his life in its metal clutches, he pressed on the gas, and molded his car into a tree because the impulse hacked at him until he was the punctured frog on its deathbed.  

 

Class was dismissed with a bell that struck panic into Jake, raking through his whole body with a sharp breath like an arrow through his chest. He pulled his security upwards, feeling like his stomach would bleed through them with the pressure, but he had played house at his psychotic thoughts enough to tear away the emotions brought, like wasted paper, or nights saying good night- no more feeling attached. He was accustomed to the burning left behind.

 

This time, however, as he stood, slinging onto his shoulder, he cried out, black swarming his vision, thoughts arriving on a spinning carousel, back and forth, back and forth, with each labored breath he took. He clamped a hand over his mouth as he felt someone grab onto his legs, but the motion following was white static too numb to compose against the symphony of tingling existence washing around him like a swimming pool.

 

Next thing he remembered, he was in the janitor closet, shirt torn off and bandages exposed. Bare, sweaty skin with heaving breaths wrecked him as he held white knuckles against a nearby bucket, air filling with the odor of bile and tears. A hand reached to his back, soothing circles above the burns of ace, calming the atmosphere with coos. Goosebumps covered his skin as he finally leaned his forehead onto the rim, face covered in snot, eyes red and puffy. He didn’t flinch when he felt his security, the ace wraps slowly unwind, a release of sore muscles underneath, marks embedded into them like battle scars.

 

“Breathe.” Dave whispered softly, rolling up the ace, Jake’s skin slowly regaining a glow of life with every open-mouthed breath that lodged in his throat as he stifled more sobs, “Fuck, breathe,” Jake nodded, as Dave’s fingers padded up and and down Jake’s back, skimming over the arch of his spine, his lower back, his ribs curling through. He stayed in this trance forever, passing delicate fingernails over his skin, breaking down his frantic breaths into nothing more than closed eyes and open souls.

 

The next day, Dave stole from his brother in order to buy Jake a binder.

 

Dave’s eyes bruised over once more.

 

* * *

 

 

When they both understood each other finally,  they were in their twenties, right out of college with enough money to own an apartment, but not enough to afford therapy, the hours of work, the weeks of food, for the amount of one session to take them and chain them to the earth, so they never went to therapy. They stayed with the idle bees humming and stinging their souls through hours spent in Houdini box and hours with mirrors to keep from seeing the reminisce of bruises caked under skin broken and eyes bruised.  

 

 _I am tired, Jake. I am so tired, but I cannot go to sleep. I am so tired but I’ve been sleeping so long before, and I want to craw back into my bed and rest there for the rest of my life because I am so, so tired of everything living that I am too afraid to live myself._  Dave wrote again and again, paper after paper, but he threw it away.

 

Jake broke his chains against Dave instead of asking for help, lashing with words worth daggers to pierce into their change, with cuts he knew would never heal.

 

Slowly, that night, as the house grew silent, the creaking off the floorboards echoing the cursed cries of toxic words as Jake slowly slunk into Dave’s room, padding into bed with Dave as he whispered an apology into the bare skin of his arms.

 

Jake walked out of surgery, the tears driven from his chest ripped open and put sideways as a new walkway for his future and a new hope instilled inside of him. Three years of Dave saving up for it, every scrap, every coin found between the floorboards, so much contempt brought into a glass jar that when it was filled, Jake debated staying home to celebrate with Dave.

 

His chest was sore, aching with a dull pain brought together in a catastrophe of fiery emotions with the twist of the temporary ace pulled tight around his middle. He hunched over, hands pressing onto his stomach as Dave met him mid-walk, pulling him into a hug that broke through the pain he felt, the obnoxious throbbing that ceased to quit no matter the medicine, and the aching felt in the pit of his mind of guilt, for peculiar reasons unknown.

 

“Horsefeathers, everything hurts to the moon and back,” He groaned, lightly ghosting his hands over the small bandages covering what scars would soon arise. A pained expression flashed against his features as he tore his hands down to rest at his middle. Everything he once suffered was soon faded, a bubbling feeling dragging up his throat in seized laughter.

 

“Complaining about top surgery are we?” Dave scoffed, sitting at the foot of the bed, crossing one leg over the other and resting his chin on his hands,

 

“Oh, you think you are just the cat’s meow!” Jake rolled his eyes, clenching his eyes shut tightly as he he managed into a sit, Dave’s hand resting on his hip to guide him, “Thanks,” He croaked out, clearing his throat.

 

“Anything I can getcha’?” Dave quirked an eyebrow, shades discarded; Jake shook his head, “Here,” Dave insisted, hands falling to the hems of his shirt as he pulled it off his head,

 

“Ptch. And here I thought you were getting all dolled up for me,” Jake’s voice trailed off, finding the courage to muster delicate touches to Dave’s skin, like thin glass or broken ribs, he traced his collarbone, the curves against his neck and the tight muscle laying underneath, dancing fingers up his jaw and brushing knuckles against smooth skin, “Fuck.” He gagged out, free hand moving between his teeth as he bit onto the digit.

 

“Sup?” Dave’s voice soothed other as Jake slowly laid back down,

 

“Happy.” He stated curtly before groaning once more, “Emotions are a scary thing, I would not recommend them.” He chuckled lowly, holding wrists to his forehead as his eyes drifted shut, as if he was behind the dagger, infection spreading to a diluted head now deranged.

 

“Trusting my human shield here, don’t let me down,” Soon, the hand carried him away with the change now finished, just in time for the blood to crust over and bruise like eyes.


End file.
